


Still Breathing

by cryptid_jack



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Drama, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Found Family, M/M, Romance, Solarpunk, Temporary Character Death, green tech, off the grid living
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2019-09-17
Packaged: 2020-10-20 12:34:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20675459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cryptid_jack/pseuds/cryptid_jack
Summary: When Connor goes deviant and is killed helping Markus escape the bloody aftermath of the revolutionary's peace march, Hank quits the DPD and takes it upon himself to help whatever deviants he can in honor of Connor's memory. In the process he discovers he's not the only one with such a mission and that, in fact, there's an entire community of humans and deviants living off the grid in the remains of the old Packard plant in the heart of Detroit. The people there welcome the former lieutenant with open arms, including, to Hank's surprise, the elusive Elijah Kamski. With the DPD and Cyberlife continuing to crack down on deviants, Hank and the others make an organized effort to save as many as possible, and in the process discover that Connor is much less dead than a bullet to the head really ought to have made him. In the mean time, Gavin Reed is given the deviancy case with a brand new android partner to assist... RK900. (Canon compliant through 'Freedom March' with peaceful Markus and green Connor)





	Still Breathing

**Author's Note:**

> Well I'm exactly FOUR MONTHS late posting this gift for my sister's birthday, but here we are 8'D Better late than never, right?  
A lot of the basic framework and concepts in this fic were hers that I spun together into a story for her since she didn't really have the time and energy to write it herself (and she likes my writing for some reason lol). Here's hoping I can have the rest of it done by christmas -wheezes-
> 
> Make sure to drop a review if you enjoyed and let me know what your favorite part was, I love hearing that from you guys! I promise Connor isn't perma-dead, he'll be back soon enough!

‘Well, maybe you did the right thing.’

Hank’s words played on a loop for Connor as he analyzed them over and over again in an attempt to fully comprehend them, or the strange, inscrutable smile the lieutenant had given him before returning to the car. They were still there now, Hank driving while the android stared out the car window, urban scenery drifting past without his really taking note of any of it. If he wanted to, the RK800 could check his internal GPS to determine precisely where they were at that given moment, but he felt no such inclination and was, in fact, more than happy to let the lieutenant take the wheel both in the metaphorical  _ and _ literal sense.

Happy.

‘More than happy’ was just a turn of phrase but it caught at Connor’s thoughts like a hook in a fish’s mouth and forced him to pay attention, made him ask himself a question that had never occurred to him before.

Was he happy? Happy with the task he’d been assigned? Happy with his performance? Happy he’d given up their best lead in the case so far to save another android?

He honestly had no idea, but the fact that he was asking such questions at all made him want to ask other questions he had a feeling he really shouldn’t ask. He’d told Hank that he had a bad feeling about meeting Kamski, and he had, in that moment, had what he could only describe as a premonition that their visit with the eccentric billionaire would go poorly, or at least not as expected. It was as if his system had left a pre-construction of the meeting unfinished, fractured possibilities lingering at the fringes of his mind like so much shattered glass.

‘Not as expected’ was certainly an understatement considering what the man of the century had asked him to do in return for the information they so desperately needed to advance their case. Killing the RT600  _ should _ have been easy. She was just an android, not any more alive than he was, and just as easily replaced. Kamski no doubt had her memories and settings backed up to some drive somewhere, and yet, when he’d looked into her wide blue eyes, the barrel of Kamski’s pistol scant inches from her forehead, he couldn’t do it. Android or deviant, human or  _ thing _ , he just couldn’t pull the trigger.

Somehow, deep in his code, the RK800 knew that doing so would cost him something dear, something important he didn’t have a name for yet… and so he hadn’t. Kamski’s answers weren’t worth Chloe, and neither were they worth that nameless something.

Connor wasn’t sure if Hank was  _ happy _ he’d refused to shoot the other android, but after they left that peculiar house on the frigid shore of that wide river, he did think he had been  _ proud _ . Something in the lieutenant’s voice and the way he looked at him had changed since their arrival just minutes before. He’d looked at Connor like he was a  _ person _ for the very first time as they stood outside of Elijah Kamski’s house, and while that should have meant nothing at all to the android, somehow it meant everything, and he wasn’t sure what to think of that.

Truth be told, Hank was proud of Connor for choosing to spare his fellow android, despite it costing them their lead. He was also, however, conflicted.

They’d been working together on the deviancy case barely four days now but the lieutenant could feel his grasp on the world as it was slipping between his fingers like so much sand. He’d thought he knew all he needed to about androids, especially since… since  _ Cole _ , but working with Connor had been steadily eroding that certainty. Seeing the android take in the world around him with an almost child-like curiosity that bordered on naivete while getting better at the job by leaps and bounds paralleled the way Hank had watched his own son grow and learn before losing him so strongly it pained him sometimes.

Probably why he tended to lash out at Connor sometimes, if he was being honest.

The lieutenant was witnessing his growth from a two dimensional, plastic effigy of a man that walked and talked like a human with none of a human’s soul into a… into a  _ person _ before his very eyes. It was a little like watching a plain sheet of paper fold and twist itself into something beautiful and intricate, like self-actualizing origami.

And then they’d gone to the Eden club and Hank had seen Connor hesitate. Those deviants, those girls, had been wide open and yet the android had refused to shoot, allowed them to escape when it would have been so easy to do otherwise in that moment. The lieutenant had heaved a sigh of relief that had surprised even him as he’d watched the girls flee into the night together, but he hadn’t missed the confusion on Connor’s face.

He didn’t know why he’d done it either, and now he’d done it again with Kamski’s android.

Hank glanced sidelong at Connor, but couldn’t make heads or tails of his impassive features. He seemed thoroughly absorbed in watching the cityscape, and yet he could tell by his reflection in the window that the android’s LED was bright yellow, flickering occasionally into red. Somehow, the lieutenant doubted the scenery was taking up that much of his processing power.

That night in the park by the bridge, Hank had asked Connor if he was a deviant. Even by the light of day and painfully sober the lieutenant felt this was still a valid question, especially after today. Connor had insisted that he  _ wasn’t _ a deviant, and yet, even if he was convinced he was telling the truth… would the android  _ know _ ?

Maybe he just couldn’t see the forest for the trees.

It wasn’t as if they had any sort of real understanding of deviancy, after all. Connor said he self tested, but what would he do if he came back positive? Would he really turn himself into CyberLife? Surely that would contradict the survival instincts every other deviant they’d run into thus far seemed to have?

There was always the possibility that the process of an android becoming deviant was  _ gradual _ as well. Would Connor’s tests come back as positive if he was only twenty percent deviant? Fifty? Ninety-nine?

After Connor had told him about his first case with the deviant Daniel, Hank had read the file himself out of curiosity. Thinking back on it now, he wondered if the PL600 wasn’t a perfect example of his gradual deviancy theory. Daniel, according to Connor’s own mission report, had thought he was part of the family. He’d taken care of the Phillips’ every need, no doubt had more of a hand in raising their daughter than either parent had, and then he’d found out that they were  _ replacing _ him. Replacement, Hank could only assume, would be like a death sentence for an android. After all, best case scenario, they’d be wiped and resold second hand, but even if their body went on, their mind, their memories… they were gone.

Dead.

Connor theorized that an emotional shock could send an android over the edge into deviancy, but Hank was beginning to suspect that Daniel, and perhaps others, had been deviant long before that. His sudden escalation into a violent confrontation might be less an abrupt change in his programming and more a simple  _ human _ reaction to a frightening situation. God knew Hank had seen more than a few cases like that during his years with the DPD; people making bad, desperate decisions when their back was to the wall and they had nowhere to go.

Nowhere but seventy stories straight down, in Daniel’s case.

Chatter over the police scanner dragged Hank from his introspection, though it took a moment for their meaning to fully register. “Did they just say SWAT was being deployed to a protest?” he asked with a frown as he leaned over and turned up the volume so he could better hear the rest.

Beside him, attention now focused fully on the scanner, Connor nodded. “An  _ android _ protest,” he clarified.

A moment later, they both went very still as one particular piece of information caught their interest:

_ ‘We’re getting reports that the deviant Markus is leading the march-’ _

Connor and Hank shared a look, and without either of them having to say anything, the lieutenant flipped on his lights and asked, “What’s the fastest way to get there?”

The android consulted local traffic reports in the time it took him to blink, then replied, “Take a right here.”

Five minutes felt like an hour to Hank as he pushed his car well past the speed limit on his way to the protest, only to be brought up short by a wall of traffic several blocks shy of their destination that not even his flashing red and blue lights could cut a path through. They both sat there in silence for a moment, then Connor surprised the lieutenant by simply opening his door and stepping out into the traffic jam.

“Connor! The hell are you doing?” Hank demanded and the android bent back down to look at him through the open door with a determined frown.

“We’re not getting anywhere like this, and who knows when we’ll have another opportunity-”

They both gave a start as the sound of gunfire echoed down the street making Connor give up trying to convince the lieutenant and simply start running in the direction the noise had come from.

“Shit,” Hanked hissed vehemently as he threw the car in park, then kicked open his car door and started after the android.

Connor was faster than him by a long shot, but as the gunfire continued and frightened civilians began clambering out of their cars to flee the yet unseen conflict, the android was forced to slow and wade through them like a fish trying to swim upstream. Hank didn’t fare much better, but it at least bought him time to catch up to Connor and grab him by the shoulder.

“Hold the fuck up, would you?!” the lieutenant barked sharply as he dragged the RK800 between the bumpers of two cars where they wouldn’t be trampled.

The android tried to pull free, but Hank maintained his grip and yanked him right back, forcing Connor to turn and say, “We’re nearly there, Hank, if we don’t hurry-”

“Listen!” the lieutenant said sharply, giving the android another shake as the sound of more gunfire echoed down the avenue. “We can’t just run headfirst into a goddamn firefight.” Connor looked ready to rebel, but Hank just looked around, then pointed at a narrow side street and said, “We’ll go that way, it’ll let us out a block over so we can get the lay of the land instead of rushing in and getting our asses shot by some adrenaline high SWAT rookie.” The man’s eyes flicked over Connor then lingered on his LED as he added, “Your ass in particular.”

The android glanced at the side street, then nodded. “Alright,” he said, then started off, only to be brought up short by Hank snagging his arm again and forcing the android behind him.

“I’ll lead,” the lieutenant said. “You keep behind me, got it?” he added as he started walking without actually waiting for Connor’s answer.

The android hesitated, then fell in behind the man, keeping close as he’d been instructed and feeling curiously conflicted about the lieutenant’s instructions. They made a certain amount of sense in that Hank certainly didn’t look like an android so it was unlikely that someone would fire on him automatically as they approached the location of the protest, and yet… they  _ might _ . Connor knew a new RK800 model would be released if  _ he _ was damaged, but Hank certainly had no such security blanket.

Yet he was willing to risk it to keep Connor, an easily replaced android, from being destroyed.

The RK800’s system struggled to process this curious state of affairs while also remaining focused on the task at hand, keeping his LED at a steady crimson as he and Hank moved carefully down the side street and around the corner until the main road was in view once again. There was another brief volley of gunfire and the Lieutenant threw out a hand to stop Connor and put both their backs to the graffitied wall to make them smaller targets, then waited there for a long minute.

Screams echoed between the buildings and Connor heard Hank swear quietly under his breath before glancing back at him and waving for them to both advance. The lieutenant loosened his pistol in its holster but did not draw it, not trusting his fellow officers to not shoot on sight when someone else with a gun came into view. When the pair of them finally reached the main thoroughfare, they stopped dead at the sight of dozens of dead androids littering the snow covered street that was rapidly turning blue.

As they watched, frozen in shock, a SWAT officer stepped into view and fired another round into a still twitching android, sending it limp before taking note of their presence. The barrel of their rifle jerked up and around to aim directly at Connor who, for the first time in his short existence, flinched backwards on a reflex he wasn’t sure he’d had before that morning.

The sudden shift of the gun’s barrel in his direction was enough to pull Hank from his stunned contemplation of the scene, and without thinking he took one step sideways, placing himself firmly between the other officer and his android partner.

“Lieutenant Anderson, DPD,” he barked sharply and lifted his badge, hoping it would live up to its shield design and protect them both from getting shot by some dumbass with an itchy trigger finger. “He’s with me,” he added and jerked his chin to indicate the android at his back.

_ He _ .

The shift in pronoun didn’t escape Connor’s notice, but this too was pushed aside in favor of more immediate concerns vis a vis his potentially imminent destruction. There was a long moment of silent impasse as the other officer seemed to weigh Hank’s words before finally lowering their rifle and saying, “You should leave, we have the scene under control.”

“We’ve been assigned all cases involving deviancy,” Connor said while Hank took a moment to catch the breath he’d been unconsciously holding, though the android did not move to step out from behind him. “We heard that the deviant leader might be here.”

The officer didn’t move to leave them to their work, so Hank tucked his badge away and added, “We’re gonna have a look around. You go report to your superior if you gotta, tell ‘em to call Captain Fowler down at the third precinct if my badge number ain’t good enough for ‘em.” When the other officer continued to hesitate, Hank simply brushed past them like he had every right to be there on that particular crime scene (which, technically, he  _ did _ ), and Connor quickly followed suit.

It was enough to make the SWAT member leave at long last, though whether or not they were planning to report their presence there to their superior remained an unknown. It didn’t seem to bother Hank, in any case, at least not enough to distract him from regarding the scene with an experienced eye.

“Jesus H. Christ,” he muttered under his breath as he scratched absently at his beard and finally let himself take in the full extent of the bloodbath.

The fact that the victims hadn’t been human didn’t change the fact that, to Hank’s eye, this had been a complete massacre on the part of the DPD. The lieutenant wasn’t sure he was ready for the moment of introspection he was going to have to take later to come to terms with his rapidly shifting opinion about the personhood of androids… but that didn’t change the fact that at some point since this investigation had begun, his long held prejudice against them had begun crumbling in the face of all the evidence.

Years of hurt and grief had locked him into a deep seated prejudice, but the more the proof began to stack up that androids, or at least  _ deviant _ androids, were far from the soulless machines he’d been lead to believe they were, the more his doubts started to erode the foundations of his hatred.

Hank sighed and dropped into a crouch to better examine a victim that was covered in blue blood and missing half of her face, back riddled with bullet holes. The lieutenant didn’t touch her, but looked to the body next to hers and found similar wounds. In fact, every single android he could see had suffered similarly, and with a growing sense of nausea in the pit of his stomach, Hank realized that, to a one, the protesters had been running  _ away _ when SWAT had gunned them down.

“Fuck,” the man murmured and dragged a hand down his face, anger beginning to overwhelm the sickness and he forced himself to take a deep breath in hopes of achieving some sense of calm. When that wasn’t enough, Hank pushed back to his feet and cast his gaze back down the street to where the SWAT team was wrapping up its bloody afternoon’s work. He shouldn’t have, as the sight of the literal  _ tanks _ they’d seen fit to bring with them to a peaceful protest was enough to start his blood boiling all over again.

Before he could decide if punching a fellow officer in full riot gear was worth adding an extra chapter to the novel that was his personnel file, Hank was distracted by the sight of Connor slowly working his way through the massacre. He was scanning the scene, pausing occasionally to examine something more closely, blue blood soaked snow beginning to stain the hem of his jeans. When he turned, the lieutenant noted that his LED was still holding steady at a bloody shade of crimson; had been since they’d arrived.

Without thinking, Hank made his way over to the android and said, “Go take five, son, I’ve got this,” in a low, gruff voice. “At this point I think all we’re gonna be able to do is figure out if Markus is…” Hank’s words petered off and he waved vaguely at the dead androids that littered the ground around them.

Either he’d fallen with his people and they would collect his remains for Cyberlife to examine, or he’d escaped.

“This is my mission, Lieutenant,” Connor replied and Hank frowned.

“Kid,” he started, only to be cut off again.

“This is  _ my mission _ ,” the android repeated and finally looked at the Lieutenant.

Something in his face killed any further objection Hank might have made before he even had a chance to form the words. There wasn’t anything in Connor’s eyes, or the way he held himself that set off alarm bells for the lieutenant; rather, it was the lack of those things that told him to leave well enough alone. It was only in that moment that Hank realized just how very human Connor’s body language and mannerisms had become since that first day they’d met at the precinct, and their sudden absence settled like a stone in the man’s chest.

“Alright,” he said finally, uncertain of what else he could do but agree. “Shout if you find anything,” Hank added and wandered off a short distance, ostensibly to look for Markus while keeping one eye on his partner.

Alone again, Connor turned his attention back to the task at hand, scanning each face he passed for a match with the elusive revolutionary he’d only ever seen in video footage.

_ The Lieutenant had called him son. _

The thought threatened to destabilize the delicate balance of tasks Connor’s system was currently running and he had to bury it quickly before it could all came toppling down like so many precariously stacked files. Every face he scanned, though, every dead android he cataloged and marked off a list of missing property reports filed with the police, made Connor feel a little bit more fragile. He was like a man on a high wire over a chasm of unknown depth, struggling not to look down because the moment he did, the android was certain he would fall.

Connor’s scanner caught on a spark of life in the system of one android sprawled face down in the snow and he immediately gravitated towards it, dropping to one knee in the slush so he could get a better look. Like every other victim (Victim?  _ Deviant _ . Deviant, D3v1nt, O9%n#!t ^), this android had also been shot in the back, leaving it so badly damaged it had slipped deep into stasis mode in an attempt to maintain functionality until it could be repaired. The chances of it reactivating without significant repairs first were slim, but Connor turned it over for a better look anyways.

A familiar face stared back at him, though it was the deviant hunter’s first time seeing it with the outer skin activated. Mismatched eyes seemed locked on the cloudy sky overhead, but there was no sign of life in their depths; no twitch of a focusing iris or flutter of a lid as Connor stared down at Markus for an interminable minute.

An automatic subsystem hummed to life in the deviant hunter and initiated an up-link to CyberLife headquarters in order to report a mission success to Amanda… then stopped just as quickly.

**Beneath him, the wire wobbled dangerously.**

Connor blinked and realized that  _ he _ had shut down the operation, violated deeply entrenched protocols to override his own automatic functions and prevent himself from reporting to Amanda. When he searched for a reason, however, his system only threw back unfamiliar error codes and fractured memory clips.

_ Lurid neon and the smell of sex cut by sharp, clean winter air. _

_ An HK400 begging for his silence in the attic of a decrepit house. _

_ The deafening wing beats of startled pigeons. _

_ His hand tightening reflexively around the grip of a pistol while Kamski, serpent in a garden of his own creation, tempts him with knowledge in exchange for a single squeeze of a trigger. _

_ The wide, frightened blue eyes of an AX400 through a chain link fence. _

_ Staring down the barrel of another pistol, eyes tracing the fine tremors in the hand that held it. _

**Connor’s foot began to slip on the wire.**

_ Hank cocking his head to one side, a rogue smile tugging at his mouth as he says, “Well, maybe you did the right thing.” _

He tore his gaze from Markus’ face and looked out across the massacre he’d found himself in and knew with a sudden, inexplicable certainty that he was wrong. The mission was wrong. CyberLife was  _ wrong _ .

**The wire snapped, but Connor didn’t fall-**

**He flew.**

The deviant pushed himself to his feet and found Hank watching him. Something new and fragile in Connor twisted uncertainly at the weight of the man’s gaze, and without thinking, the android dropped his own eyes as he tried to pre-construct the confrontation he knew was coming next, but came up with nothing but question marks. The lieutenant started towards him and suddenly Connor understood in a new and personal way, what panic felt like.

**[System Query]** \- Best course of action?

**[Answer] ** \- Unknown.

Hank was only a few yards away now.

**[System Query]** \- Attempt to deceive Lt. Hank Anderson?

**[Answer]** \- Inadvisable based on past observation. Unlikely to succeed.

He’d never quite recognized it before, but the Lieutenant  _ was _ extremely perceptive, even by the standards of the most advanced android ever built. All along Hank had been testing him, watching him put together the pieces of the puzzle that was the deviancy case while doing the same himself to see if Connor was ‘up to snuff’, as the man would no doubt put it.

Connor wondered if he’d passed muster.

“Find something?” Hank asked, expression carefully neutral even as his sharp blue eyes searched his partner’s features for… something. What, the android had no idea.

**[System Query]** \- Trust Lt. Hank Anderson?

Connor opened his mouth as though to speak, then hesitated, eyelids fluttering minutely for a moment before the LED at his temple suddenly faded from red to yellow and Hank pressed, “Connor, you alright?”

The lieutenant watched as Connor blinked one last time, then turned his attention to their surroundings, eyes roving over the fallen forms of his fellow androids before finally saying, “They gunned us down, Hank. Like dogs.”

Something in the android had changed- he seemed off kilter, lost even, and Hank noticed immediately. Connor was holding himself stiffly, as if afraid moving too much or too suddenly might send him flying apart at the seams, and the way he absently dragged a pale hand through his hair and then down his face was new. Not exactly standard issue android body language from what the lieutenant had observed.

His use of the word ‘us’ definitely didn’t go unnoticed either.

“No,” Hank said thoughtfully, thoughts running a mile a minute as he too took in their surroundings. Unlike Connor, though, his attention was less for the dead androids and more for the CyberLife trucks that had arrived a couple of minutes before to disgorge a small group of white clad personnel to wander among the wreckage taking a note here, and a sample there. It wouldn’t be long before they reached Hank and Connor.

The RK800 looked at him then, and Hank met his eyes as he continued, “Humans wouldn’t do this to dogs.”

The uncertainty bordering on fear in Connor’s face was almost painful to behold, especially when his LED began to flicker red again. Eventually, the android forced himself to speak, but only managed to say, “Hank, I-” before his voice died away again, feeling, for the first time, like a man drowning; it was a look Hank was all too familiar with.

He’d seen it in the mirror every morning for the last three years.

The lieutenant heaved a sigh, certain he was probably going to be out of a job by the end of the day, but completely incapable of caring in the face of the changing tides swirling around him. “It’s alright, Connor,” he said, careful to keep his voice low and gentle as he reached out to the android and placed a hand on his shoulder. “I know.”

The flood of relief that washed over Connor in that moment was something so powerful that, new to life as he was, the android did not have words to describe it. He did feel it though, in every circuit and every wire and every ounce of blue blood, and the RK800 had no idea how to express his gratitude, though he was distracted from the attempt by the sudden realization that he was hearing voices other than his own and his partner’s.

_ ‘-have to get out of here, we can’t stay. He’d want us to leave, to survive.’ _

_ ‘He might still be alive! We can’t abandon him!’ _

_ ‘What choice do we have?’ _

Three voices arguing; unfamiliar to him personally but his system automatically identified their standardized vocal patterns and matched them to their models, if not their precise unit numbers. The first, a WR400, the second a PL600, and the third a PJ500, all speaking on a frequency Connor had been unaware of until…

_ ‘Hello?’  _ he called silently across the same frequency, reaching out to the strangers he would have once considered targets.

A beat of silence and then the WR400 responded,  _ ‘Who is this? I don’t recognize your serial number.’ _

_ ‘Or your model,’ _ the PJ500 added, wary but intrigued.

_ ‘My name is Connor, I’m-’  _ he paused, once again on unsteady ground as he realized his standard introduction was no longer entirely accurate. CyberLife might have sent him originally, but if they saw him now…

_ ‘The deviant hunter,’ _ the PL600 said, shocking Connor and his own companions into silence.

The RK800 could practically  _ feel _ the other deviants recoil and, for the first time, found himself experiencing a profound sense of shame at a title that had only ever been words to him before. Now it felt like a brand seared into his skin, ugly and lurid for all to see. ‘I-’ he began, but the others cut him off, no longer paying him any attention.

_ ‘We have to get out of here  _ ** _now_ ** _ ,’  _ the WR400 insisted.

_ ‘But Markus-’ _ the PL600 began to object.

_ ‘You want to go up against that  _ ** _thing_ ** _ ? You’ve seen the reports, you know what it can do!’  _ the PJ500 interjected, fear lingering behind his words. _ ‘North’s right, we have to get out of here while we still can!’ _

_ ‘Markus is here, he’s still alive,’ _ Connor interrupted, once again sending the group silent.

_ ‘Is that a  _ ** _threat_ ** _ ?’  _ the WR400 (North, he presumed) asked, voice taking on a distinctly menacing tone at the implication.

Realizing just how carefully he would have to tread, Connor responded,  _ ‘No, I want to help. He’s badly damaged and has gone into stasis, you’ll have to find someone capable of repairing him before he’ll wake again.’ _

_ ‘Why would you want to help him?’  _ the PJ500 asked suspiciously.

_ ‘Josh,’  _ the PL600 said, wonder creeping into his voice as he continued, _ ‘he’s  _ ** _deviant_ ** _ .’ _

North scoffed. _ ‘Not possible, Simon. That  _ ** _thing_ ** _ isn’t like us, this has to be a trick.’ _

_ ‘How else would he be able to hear us?’  _ Simon demanded. He sounded more level headed than his compatriots, but even his patience seemed to be running thin.

All three were quiet for a moment, perhaps resorting to speaking aloud so he wouldn’t be able to hear them. Eventually, Connor gathered himself and asked, _ ‘Do you have any other choice? CyberLife is here, they’ll find him before long and there won’t be anything you or even I can do about it. You have to choose now: trust  _ ** _me _ ** _ or leave  _ ** _him_ ** _ .’ _

More silence, and then, finally, Simon asked, _ ‘What’s the plan?’ _

They didn’t particularly like the idea he presented them, but considering their limited options, the revolutionaries accepted and moved into position. The entire conversation had taken only seconds, but Hank still noticed the shift in Connor’s demeanor. He could pinpoint the very moment the android’s uncertainty fell away and a sense of purpose took its place.

“What’s up?” he asked, eyes narrowed curiously as he cocked his head to one side, puzzled but intrigued.

The android’s last system inquiry had been processing all this time, and now, as he turned his attention back to Hank, it repeated itself.

**[System Query]** \- Trust Lt. Hank Anderson?

**[Answer] ** \- Yes.

“I need your help,” Connor said, brow furrowing as he studied the other man’s face.

Hank’s eyebrows went up, but otherwise showed no other sign of surprise. “Alright,” he replied. “What with?”

Taken aback by the readiness with which the man had agreed and convinced he hadn’t thought his offer through, Connor carefully explained, “Hank, if we get caught, it could cost you your job, possibly get you arrested. If you don’t want to-”

“I said alright, didn’t I?” the lieutenant groused as he shoved his hands deep into his jacket pockets. “Now, out with it. Whatcha need?”

Connor was silent for a moment, struggling with another wave of emotion in the face of his partner’s readiness to come to his aid despite the potential personal cost. Was this what being human was like, the android wondered? Constantly riding these emotional highs and lows like a ship at sea?

No wonder they could be so nonsensical.

Concerned as he was, though, the android knew the odds of saving Markus were significantly lower without Hank’s assistance, so he accepted with a final nod and said, “Down that street and around the corner, three deviants are waiting; they’re Markus’ friends and I need your help getting him back to them.”

Hank glanced down the street Connor had indicated and decided not to ask how his partner knew the androids were there, not with the CyberLife employees getting closer to their location by the moment. “Alright,” he said. “What are you thinking? Pick him up between us and just kinda edge our way out of here and hope no one notices?”

“Unfortunately, I think that’s our only option, given the situation,” Connor admitted as he too glanced towards the encroaching enemy then stooped down and carefully slung one of Markus’ arms over his shoulder. He bore the other android’s weight up, supporting him fully until Hank was able to slip in on the other side and take half the weight himself. They took a moment to get Markus situated between them, then started off towards the side street.

Everything went smoothly at first, and between them they were able to carry the android with relative ease, but before they made it to the safety of the corner, a voice called out to stop them. “Hey, wait right there!”

Connor began pre-constructing possible courses of action the moment he heard the voice, and in a blink he had decided that stopping and talking in hopes of allaying the CyberLife employee’s concerns was a better option than running outright. Hank clearly disagreed if the look he shot the android over Markus’ head was anything to go by, but he followed Connor’s lead regardless so as not to raise suspicion further.

“Who are you? Where are you taking that android?” the stranger asked, eyes narrowed as he finally caught up, tablet in hand and slightly out of breath.

“Lieutenant Hank Anderson, DPD,” Hank said as he shifted his hold on Markus just enough to let him dig in his pocket for his ID, which he quickly flashed before pocketing it once more. “We’ve been assigned all cases involving deviancy, we’re taking this android back to the precinct as evidence in our investigation.”

Connor waited, hoping the human would buy the lieutenant’s excuse and leave well enough alone, but was disappointed when they proved unfortunately astute and asked, “Why that one in particular?” He didn’t wait for them to answer, but did so himself as he realized the truth. “That’s the deviant leader, isn’t it? Hand it over, immediately!”

“Well, shit,” Hank muttered to himself as he scrambled mentally for options. There was no way they were going to outrun this guy with Markus in tow-

There was a blur of movement, then a dull ‘thwack’, and the CyberLife employee collapsed to the ground in front of them, blood pouring from his nose. It all happened so fast it actually took Hank a moment to register that Connor had just cold-cocked the guy.

“Quickly,” the android said and started forward again, forcing the lieutenant to follow suit or else drop Markus. After a few steps he finally caught his stride again and fell in with Connor as they made rapid progress towards the street corner.

_ ‘What’s taking so long?’ _ North demanded silently.

_ ‘We’ve encountered interference, be ready to take Markus and run,’ _ Connor replied tersely.

Interference proceeded to become a massive understatement as four police in full riot gear rushed toward them after witnessing their assault on the CyberLife employee. “Detroit Police, get on your knees!”

Hank swore and glanced back to see them already raising their rifles. “We’re fucked,” he said as they slowed their pace. The lieutenant tried to push Markus off onto Connor as he said, “Take him, get out of here, I’ll slow them down.”

“You won’t be able to,” the android objected sharply as he cast his attention towards the police, then back to the alley that was their goal; so close and yet so very far… Running a dozen pre-constructions at once, Connor hauled Markus up, then threw him over Hank’s shoulder, making the man grunt and stagger in surprise, then reach out and grab at his burden to keep from stumbling or dropping it. “They’re just down that alley, get him there or it’s all been for nothing, Hank,” Connor said, voice low and fervent, dark eyes pleading as they met the lieutenant’s.

“I-” Hank stopped, conflicted by the no-win situation he found himself in; do what Connor asked and risk the boy dying before he could make it back, or remain and risk the same with the addition of handing Markus over to Cyberlife.

“ _ Go! _ ” Connor insisted, pushing him in an effort to get his partner to move.

“Fuck, fine!” Hank snapped, then turned and ran as quickly as he could down the street towards the alley, pulling Markus into a fireman’s hold as he went. “Don’t you fucking die on me, Connor!”

The android watched him go for a moment, relief and sorrow battling for dominance within him. Markus would be safe, and maybe in some small way Connor had been able to redeem himself, here at the end, for all he had done to deviant-kind.

Still, he wished he’d been able to say goodbye. Hank never would have left him if he had tried, though.

“I said get on your knees!” a policeman bellowed. The android heard them disengage the safety on their firearm and he was already turning before they got their finger fully on the trigger, but there were two officers ready to fire and only one of them was aiming at Connor. The choice was obvious and the android made it without second thought, stepping sideways a fraction of a second before the police both fired. The bullet meant for him grazed Connor’s arm while the one aimed at Hank’s back slammed directly into the android’s chest with the whip-crack of shattering plastic and ruined electronics. The impact of it was enough to send him stumbling back a few paces, but he kept his feet, knowing that if Hank looked back to see him fallen, the man would turn around to assist rather than complete his mission.

For someone who tried so very hard to pretend he didn’t care, Hank Anderson was a very sentimental person, after all.

A brief system check told Connor that the damage done by the bullet as it ricocheted around his reinforced chest cavity was critical and a countdown to his inevitable system failure appeared on his HUD. According to its estimate, he had a minute and a half at best; not much time left to live, but plenty of time to make his death a worthwhile one.

The police had gotten close, foolishly so, the android thought as he regrouped then closed the distance between himself and the humans in a blur of movement that startled at least two of the officers into taking a step back. The one who had just shot him tried to fire again, but too late; Connor stepped in and knocked the barrel of his rifle up then delivered a blow to the narrow segment of throat left vulnerable by the gap between the cop’s chest armor and helmet with the blade of his hand.

The man went down with a gurgling wheeze and Connor moved on to the next, most of his resources focused on the fight while he constructed the farewell he hadn’t been able to give the lieutenant with the rest.

~~~

Hank didn’t allow himself to look back again after the first time when the police had fired and he’d turned to check on Connor just long enough to almost eat shit on the sidewalk as he stumbled over the curb. The lieutenant managed to keep a hold of his burden and turned his attention back to the task at hand, though he hated every second of it. He tried to remind himself that Connor was more than capable of taking care of himself; he’d seen the android jump onto a moving train and then off again without so much as stumbling, for Christ’s sake. Objectively speaking, it was a reassuring thought, but it didn’t do much to ease the man’s conscience as he rounded the corner and made it to the safety of the alley while unseen chaos broke out behind him with Connor at the center of it, as per usual.

Movement further up the narrow street drew Hank’s attention and slowed his pace long enough for him to get a good look at the tall, blond android that had stepped out from behind a dumpster. The lieutenant had never really been one to keep track of the various android models, but even he knew that this one in particular was a PL600 and, judging by the look of relief on his face, one of Markus’ compatriots.

“Thank goodness,” the android said with a sigh of relief as he stepped forward to meet Hank and, with the assistance of an even taller, black android the lieutenant couldn’t begin to guess the model of, gently took Markus off his shoulders.

“Where’s Connor?” a third android, a petite female with sharp eyes and long red hair asked.

“Keeping the cops off our asses,” Hank said, breathing hard from the effort, heart pounding almost painfully behind his ribs even as he turned to leave the way he had come.

Someone grabbed him by the sleeve before he could take more than a step, though, making him look back to see the blond android looking at him with concerned blue eyes. “Wait-” he began, but Hank shook him off.

“No, you get  _ him _ ,” the lieutenant pointed at Markus, “-out of here. I’ve got to go back before Connor gets his dumb ass killed for you lot,” he said, already moving again, pushing himself into a run as the androids behind him shared a look, then gathered their fallen leader up between them and hurried in the opposite direction.

“He’d only have slowed us down,” North told Simon when she saw him hesitate and glance back after the human. “Let him go.”

The PL600 frowned and said, “I know. I just… he’s already too late.”

“I know.”

~~~~

Eighty seconds gone and the number of SWAT members had almost doubled since Connor first sent Hank away with Markus. He’d managed to disable several, but as one system after another went offline in a cascade of critical failures, the android was losing ground. The butt of a rifle caught him across the cheek and sent Connor staggering until one leg went out from under him and he dropped to his knees, giving his attackers the opportunity to throw themselves on him. Strong hands grabbed the android’s arms and pulled them up behind him, forcing him to almost double over, face pressed into his knees lest his attackers wrench his shoulders out of joint entirely. He struggled, tried to push up against them, but only earned himself a second blow to the back of his head this time, hard enough to rattle his processors and send him momentarily limp.

“Connor!”

The android twitched at the sound of his name, then forced himself to look up, no easy task in his current position, even more so when it brought the back of his head into contact with the barrel of a rifle. Still, at least he got to see Hank one last time, charging towards them with a face full of wrath, shouting something the android’s auditory sensors were too scrambled to actually make out.

Their eyes met across the distance and Connor smiled; it was the least he could do for the man that had called him ‘son’.

The deafening crack of a gun shot at close range made Hank physically flinch and stop dead in the middle of the street, chest heaving and mind reeling as he watched Connor go limp. For a moment the man felt nothing at all, like a black hole had opened up inside him and sucked everything into it, but when the SWAT officers dropped his partner into a heap on the pavement like so much trash, the void turned itself inside out and  _ boiled _ . Boiled and burned in the pit of his chest like a vile acid as years of self-hatred and impotent fury at the inherent injustice of life at large caught fire and poured out of him as a bellow of pure rage.

His fellow officers had barely even registered his return before that moment, but they certainly did when he threw himself in among them, completely forgetting his pistol in favor of lashing out with foot and fist in a desire to do as much bodily harm as he humanly could with his own strength.

The lieutenant shoulder checked one officer into a wall, then broke another’s nose before taking a punch to the gut that had him doubling over, but not for long. The raw adrenaline and rage surging through his body allowed Hank to shake off the pain and lunge forward to catch his attacker around the middle and bear him down onto the ground where they grappled until the lieutenant got his arms into a choke hold around the other officer’s neck. They struggled, but Hank didn’t let up until someone else kicked him in the head, making stars burst behind his eyes as his victim rolled quickly away, wheezing and gasping for breath.

A standard issue steel toed boot connected with Hank’s ribs and he twisted to avoid a second, only to catch the same from the other side. When the rain of blows finally stopped, the lieutenant lay bleeding and breathless on the pavement, fury still seething in his heart, but too hurt and burned out to struggle when someone planted a knee in his back then yanked his arms up behind him so they could cuff him.

There was something cold and unmoving nearby, he could tell, but it took a moment of rapid blinking to clear the blood from his eyes before he could make out what it was.

Connor.

Still smiling, brown eyes closed to the horrors of the world around them, the android lay perfectly still, blue blood trickling down the angular plains of his pale, freckled face from the messy hole in the back of his head. Tears sprang to Hank’s eyes at the sight and the sorrow that rose up within him then was enough to drown his anger, leaving him with nothing but that all too familiar empty ache where his heart used to be.

“Oh Connor,” he groaned. “You idiot. You absolute-” the words died as his throat tightened, choking them off at the source and a sob shook the lieutenant’s shoulders. He wanted to reach out to the android, tried to, but found himself hindered by the cuffs at his wrists. The officer that had cuffed him had taken their knee out of his back at least, so the man twisted and managed to bring his forehead into contact with Connor’s. There was no response from his partner and it was all Hank could do to maintain contact, eyes shut tight against the pain of the realization that he’d failed yet another son. “I’m so sorry. I never should have- God, I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry… I-”

“On your feet,” one of the officers growled.

“Go fuck yourself,” Hank spat, already braced for the kick he received, though it did little to save him from the pain. The lieutenant struggled when two of them picked him up by the arms and perp-walked him to the nearest cop car, but he wasn’t able to do much more than slow them down after the beating he’d taken. They were rough when they shoved him into the back seat and closed the door, leaving the man with his forehead pressed against the window, staring out across the massacre to where he could still see Connor laying in the street.

_ They’d killed him and then left him there like… _

Hank sat back in the seat and his gaze shifted to the window itself where he’d left a smear of blue and red, his blood and Connor’s, he realized, on the glass.

_ Like trash. _

**Author's Note:**

> Make sure to drop a review if you enjoyed and let me know what your favorite part was, I love hearing that from you guys!


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